MESSAGE IN THE MOVIES

The Social Network Rated PG 13

Directed by David Fincher.  Starring Jesse Eisenberg, Andrew Garfield.

Photo © 2010 Columbia Pictures
Movie Review by Rev. Bruce Batchelor Glader

The great opening scene of The Social Network shows a young man, filled with himself, ranting against the world to his girlfriend in a college bar.  As he prattles on, it is clear that his friend is growing tired of his company.  She finally tells him that their relationship if over. 

The young man is Mark Zuckerberg (Eisenberg), a tech savvy Harvard undergrad.  After being dumped, he goes back to his dorm room and frantically creates a snide Internet website in which classmates can rate the looks of undergraduate women.  All of this is fueled by his contempt of his ex-girlfriend. 

Mark is a smart guy with no social skills, but that doesn’t mean he can’t be a success.  The Social Network (loosely based on the nonfiction book The Accidental Billionaires by Ben Mezrich) tells the story of the creation of facebook, the most popular program on the Internet, that allows people to connect with hundreds of friends to share conversations, photos, and videos. 

It is a morality play without morality, in which self-centered rich kids take advantage of each other.  The script by Aaron Sorkin (the creator of The West Wing), cleverly flips between Mark’s story and a courtroom trial in the future in which Mark and his colleagues will face off about facebook. 

It’s a fascinating story (and how much of the tale is actually true seems to be beside the point) for our digital age, since connections on a social network can be as warm or as cold as the people who “friend” us. 

The Social Network is a well-made film, with good performances, great editing, an engaging script and an interesting story to tell.  But it has no soul. 

The endless scenes of privileged young people partying grew tiresome, and I felt that I never really got to know anyone enough to care about them. 

By the end of the movie, Mark is a lonely guy without close friends who has created a way for lonely guys without close friends to “friend” other people from a distance.  It’s another ironic tale for our times. 

But here’s the final irony: Mark Zuckerberg is a billionaire and has publicly stated that he could care less about whether this film tells the true story of his life.  He’s successfully sold facebook to the highest bidder and he is laughing all the way to the bank. 

Pitchfork/Halo Ratings:
Two halos.
An American success story without soul, which is some kind of commentary about out increasingly ambivalent ways of connecting with other people.

Four pitchforks.
One of the most hedonistic films of this decade in which sin wins, with endless scenes of partying, drinking, drug-taking and sexual activity; deceit, envy, greed, and betrayal; and a healthy amount of PG-13 swearing.

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